Healthy women could be asked to donate their eggs for cloning research in a controversial bid to speed up the development of new treatments for disease, the Guardian has learned.

Professor Ian Wilmut, creator of Dolly the sheep, is to seek permission from the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority to ask women to donate eggs for cloning experiments designed to shed light on the debilitating condition motor neurone disease.

Until now, cloning experts in Britain have justified their work by using only spare eggs left over from couples undergoing treatment at fertility clinics. The eggs are typically rejects of the IVF process and are routinely discarded if not used in experiments.

The issue raises ethical questions. Many scientists working in the field believe their research is severely hampered because the eggs they use are of such poor quality that they often do not grow into healthy clones. But others believe that asking women to donate eggs purely for research introduces a possible financial incentive that is morally objectionable.

Critics yesterday turned on Prof Wilmut's proposal, claiming it turned human eggs and the women who provide them into commodities. They also warned that any woman considering donating eggs must be fully informed of the health risks before undergoing the lengthy and sometimes painful procedure.

Prof Wilmut, who is in the process of moving from the Roslin Institute, where Dolly was created, to Edinburgh University, told the Guardian that he hoped to get high quality eggs for cloning experiments by asking healthy women to donate them specifically for his research.

In May, a team of scientists in Newcastle announced they had created the first cloned human embryo in Europe and only the second in the world, as part of a project to develop treatments for diabetes. They found that the quality of the eggs was paramount to the success of the experiments.

In an interview with the Guardian, Prof Wilmut, who was awarded a cloning licence in February, said: "I have never doubted that women would donate if they thought we were helping people to have treatment. Our hope and belief is that women who have seen the devastating effect of this disease will be prepared to make such a donation."

The proposal has already caused anger among some religious groups.

Donald Bruce, who heads the Scottish Church's society, religion and technology project, said: "There are already eggs which are available. That a researcher now wants a certain type of egg is starting to turn the egg and women into commodities. They become just a link in a process."

A spokeswoman for the HFEA refused to comment on whether Prof Wilmut's proposal had been received but said that permission would have to be granted by both an independent ethics committee and the HFEA's own licensing group.

There is nothing in the HFEA's guidelines that would prevent, in principle, women donating eggs for cloning research.

"Some women may prefer to give eggs for research than for fertility treatment, because they feel it will benefit far more people in the long run," an HFEA spokeswoman said.

Professor Alison Murdoch, who leads the Newcastle cloning team, said that the shortage of eggs was hampering research and meant that alternatives to those discarded during fertility treatment were needed desperately.

"We're not treating women specifically to get eggs for research, it's part of their fertility treatment and until we have more experience, it's not possible for us to say what is the best way to get eggs. But asking for donations is an issue that needs to be debated," she said.

The potential benefits of collecting fresh eggs from women not undergoing fertility treatment has already been demonstrated by Professor Woo Suk Hwang's world-leading team in South Korea. Having gathered eggs from women who donated eggs purely for research, the team went on to become the first to produce a cloned human embryo and earlier this year reported they had produced tissues from clones tailored to specific patients.

According to Prof Murdoch, the most pressing issue was to ensure that any woman considering donating eggs for research was sufficiently informed of the procedure, its risks and the subsequent use of her eggs, to give considered consent.

Before a woman can donate eggs, she must first undergo a process called ovarian hyperstimulation, which involves a series of hormone injections over several days to make the ovaries produce more eggs than normal. The eggs are then extracted by a surgical procedure. Although ovarian hyperstimulation is carried out routinely at fertility clinics, it is not without risks, and complications can range from abdominal pain and nausea to more dangerous and even life-threatening conditions.

Josephine Quintavalle of the pressure group, Comment on Reproductive Ethics, said concerns for the health of egg donors had prompted the group to draw up a charter on informed consent to ensure the risks are made clear. "There's a growing feeling that women are being exploited. At what point does it become right for a woman to have a procedure which has risks when there is no benefit at all for her?"

"It's no surprise that researchers are looking to fertile women to give eggs because they want them to produce optimum tissues, but there's a danger that researchers are become too gung-ho about this," she said.

Dr Bruce added: "I'm very nervous about this. Altruistic donation has a strong tradition in medicine, but any inducement to donate, whether it's moral or financial, is something we should be wary of.

"If a woman decides of her own free will that she wants to donate eggs, then that is her decision, but as soon as someone offers an incentive, even if it is not financial, it becomes a worry," he said.

A review of donation ethics, known as SEED for sperm, egg and embryo donation, is under way at the HEFA and is expected to report by the end of the year.

The race to produce stem cells

· Professor Ian Wilmut, the Roslin Institute scientist famous for creating Dolly the Sheep, was awarded a licence to clone human embryos last February. His team, which is moving to Edinburgh University, wants clones to help study motor neurone disease, a debilitating and ultimately fatal condition that affects 5,000 Britons and kills three each day. Cloning is notoriously difficult and is hampered in Britain by using poor quality eggs discarded during fertility treatment. Prof Wilmut's team is seeking permission from the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority to ask women to donate higher quality fresh eggs specifically for his research.

· The first British licence to clone human embryos was granted to Alison Murdoch of the Newcastle Fertility Centre and Miodrag Stojkovic, a cloning expert at Newcastle University in August 2004. They want to use clones to develop treatments for diabetes. In May this year, they announced they had created their first cloned embryo, although it only survived for five days and the scientists were unable to extract embryonic stem cells which would be necessary to study the disease. The single clone was produced after the team collected 36 eggs from 11 women undergoing IVF. According to Prof Murdoch, the shortage of eggs for research is severely hindering cloning research and a debate on alternatives, such as egg donors who are not undergoing fertility treatment, is needed.

· In 2004, a team of scientists from Seoul University lead by Professor Woo Suk Hwang became the first in the world to create a cloned human embryo. The team was able to extract fresh eggs from women who agreed to give their eggs purely for the project. In May this year, the team asserted their world-leading status by announcing that they had used the cloning process to create embryonic stem cells specially tailored to patients with a variety of different medical conditions, a vital step towards new therapies. The team gathered 185 eggs from 18 women. They are now believed to have created more than 60 clones from eggs taken from donors who give up between 15 to 20 eggs at a time.

· Although Chinese scientists have yet to announce the creation of any cloned human embryos, the science has been given the government's full backing. A recent British delegation to visit Chinese labs was staggered by the level of commitment and noted that the country was well placed to exploit US links.